After 37 years of silence, an El Salvador volcano violently roared to life Sunday.
Chaparrastique volcano sent a cloud of ash miles into the sky forcing the evacuation of nearby villages.
President Mauricio Funes said in a televised address that government officials cannot guarantee the mountain will not erupt again and has ordered a mandatory evacuation of all residents within two miles of the mountain.
The eruption started around 10:30 a.m. local time and the column of ash reached a peak about 3 miles high. The international airport in San Salvador had to redirect flights to other airports. Multiple flights had to be cancelled.
The volcanic ash rained down on coffee fields for miles further damaging the country’s major crop. Farmers have been fighting in infestation of leaf rust that has hampered crop yields.
Indonesian officials are scrambling to evacuate residents still surrounding Mount Sinabung as eruptions continue to grow stronger throughout the day.
The eruptions send lava and searing hot gases rushing a mile down the mountain’s slopes and shot volcanic rock at much as 6,500 feet into the air. Authorities have raised the warning level for the mountain to its highest level and warned aircraft to avoid the area.
Officials say at least 15,000 people have now been taken out of a zone three miles wide around the entire mountain.
A local farmer who fled the exclusion zone with his family said that hot ash and gravel began to rain down on his village in the early morning hours.
The eruptions are having a devastating impact on farming in the area. Farmers as far as 45 miles from the volcano’s crater are reporting hot ash falling and coating their crops.
Two volcanoes in Indonesia have erupted sending thousands fleeing and destroying entire crops.
Mount Sinabung first erupted Thursday in the early morning hours sending a plume of ash 23,000 feet into the air in the Karo region of North Sumatra. The mountain then erupted again just before noon with an ash plume that rose 16,400 feet.
Government officials rushed at least 5,500 residents away from the area.
Then today Mount Sinabung was the second Indonesia volcano to erupt in a span of hours. Mount Merapi exploded just before 5 a.m. local time send a plume of ash 6500 feet into the air. Hours later, Mount Sinabung erupted stronger than ever with an ash cloud rising 26,500 feet into the air.
The Indonesian Transportation Ministry has issued a statement to all airlines telling them to avoid the airspace surrounding the volcanoes because of the ash and their current instability.
The ash from the volcanoes has destroyed the crops of farmers surrounding the mountain who depend on their crops to live. A local farmer told the Jakarta Globe the losses to farmers in the region could end up in the billions. He said some of the farm land has been so damaged by the volcanoes they can no longer be used for farming.
Indonesia is located on the Pacific Ring of Fire.
